Insurers eye ObamaCare hikes
By Sarah Ferris – 06/01/15 05:19 PM EDT
Health insurers across the country are eyeing slightly steeper cost increases in 2016, a year that will be an important test for how well ObamaCare is working.
The costs of the lowest-tiered individual plans appear to be ticking up, according to multiple experts who have reviewed the proposed rates. The increases vary wildly among plans and among states, but experts say people are still unlikely to face the kind of doomsday scenario critics predicted would occur under the healthcare law.
“The trend is a little bit higher this year than last year,” said Gary Claxton, director of the healthcare marketplace program for the Kaiser Family Foundation.
And as in past years, some of those rate increases have been “enormous,” said Cheryl Fish-Parcham, who directs the private insurance program at the nonprofit Families USA.
Under ObamaCare, all proposed rate hikes above 10 percent were required to be posted online by Monday. Now begins a six-month back-and-forth between insurance companies and regulators as the government tries to reduce rates before locking them in this November.
“These specific rates will be subject to vigorous rate review and revision,” said Andy Slavitt, the acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
The proposed 2016 rates will offer the most accurate portrait so far about the health of the marketplaces. Claxton, who reviewed several states’ data, said many of the increases are around 15 to 20 percent, though there are large disparities across regions.
Tennessee’s biggest insurer has proposed an increase of 36 percent for some plans, while one of New Mexico’s biggest carriers is looking at a 50 percent increase. The most popular carrier in Maryland has called for a 30 percent hike.
https://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/243654-insurers-eye-obamacare-price-hikes
